An interactive art piece that uses a projected bench to raise awareness of the problem of homeless-deterring architecture. The installation uses amoebas and a bench with dividers that move up and down to show how bench dividers prevent homeless people from sleeping.

The Amoeba Bench is an Interactive art piece that uses a projected bench to raise awareness of the problem of homeless deterring architecture. The installation uses amoebas and a bench with dividers that move up and down to show how bench dividers prevent homeless people from sleeping. In Cambridge, there is a large homeless population. Both businesses and the city put in homeless-deterring architecture to solve this problem. Some of this architecture looks harmless while some of it looks hostile. The Amoeba Bench aims to point out the hostility in the harmless-looking deterrents. To most people an armrest is just an armrest to add comfort. To some homeless people, an armrest prevents them from being able to sleep on the bench and off the ground. The bench is projected onto a wall of a building next to a bench with deterring architecture. In front of the projection, there are three buttons on a stand. Each button can raise or lower one set of armrests. A computer takes in keyboard inputs and displays an animation of an armrest splitting the sleeping amoeba into segments. This exhibit hopes to reach the non-homeless population to awaken an awareness of the impact this architecture has on so many people.